Today's meditation will be a practice that those of you who have done a retreat with me will be familiar with,
Blowing upon the embers of the heart.
This is a practice that comes from the Sufi tradition,
Which is the tradition that brought us the likes of Rumi and Hafiz,
These great poets you might be familiar with,
And their whole spiritual approach is very much based on the heart,
But also very much based on embracing all that is felt,
All that is alive,
And using even the most difficult emotions as an opportunity to offer oneself to the divine,
Essentially.
So everything that arises in our daily experience from this perspective becomes fuel for the fire.
This meditation can be understood as a way to set our hearts on fire,
To bring life to the heart center.
Can also be understood as a response to the question,
What am I unwilling to feel?
So it's as if through this practice,
We are inviting that inner child within us who has maybe not expressed him or herself,
Or has not allowed oneself to feel the difficult emotions.
It's inviting those voices to express,
Not necessarily in words,
Not necessarily in words.
There's a lot that can be said about this practice,
And in retreat,
We go into a theory of it in a lot more depth,
But for now,
That's really all I'm going to say by way of introduction,
And we'll just let the practice itself unfold in an exploratory way.
So closing the eyes down as always,
And finding our comfortable position,
Relaxing the shoulders away from the ears,
Opening up through the chest,
A sense of verticality,
Of sitting up tall and steady,
Yet the body is soft,
Relaxed.
Take our few deep breaths,
With each exhale,
Just letting go of any niggling thoughts,
Any to-do lists,
Any instinct to start to strategize or plan,
Sending it all away for now,
Putting it aside,
Each breath guiding us into presence,
Awareness.
And then we guide the attention to the heart center,
And here we'll focus just in the middle of the chest,
And taking some breaths where we really focus on the expansion of the lungs,
To help guide our attention to the chest.
Notice what's there,
Notice what you can feel as you bring the attention to the heart.
Maybe there's simply a numbness,
Maybe there's not much going on there.
Maybe,
As we rest in the heart,
There's a subtle tenderness that can be felt.
Maybe there's a tightness or constriction around the heart that we notice more when we bring our attention here.
Maybe there's something uncomfortable about resting in the heart that we've been noticing.
We're just noticing without commentary,
Without judgment,
Without trying to change anything.
Exploring our capacity for interoception,
This capacity to sense the internal signals from your body that naturally starts to improve through our meditation practice.
Our sensitivity increases.
And as we keep the attention in the heart,
We're going to visualize a glowing ember in the heart center.
If you're not sure what an ember is,
If you imagine a wood fire that has just about gone out,
But the wood is still glowing a bit,
That is an ember.
You'll know that if you blow upon the ember enough,
It will come back alight.
Visualizing a glowing ember,
We're going to start to subtly increase the intensity of the breath in the chest,
But not as an external breathing practice.
It's more an attitude of rubbing the chest with the breath.
Indeed,
There's a subtle increase in intensity of the breath and this attitude of caressing,
Rubbing,
Blowing upon the embers of the heart.
Perhaps asking ourselves the question,
What am I unwilling to feel as we blow upon the embers of the heart?
And if any sensations or emotions start to bubble up,
We're just watching and holding whatever arises in our sphere of awareness and offering whatever arises as fuel for the fire in the heart,
This longing,
This aliveness,
This warmth of the heart.
We'll shortly shift into the silent portion of the practice where you'll be continuing to blow upon the embers of the heart.
And if there's a numbness,
A lack of sensation,
You might want to explore increasing the intensity of the breath.
That is optional.
And whenever you find yourself drifting away,
Come back to a practice,
This visualizing an ember in the heart,
A glowing ember,
And this breathing practice of blowing upon the embers of the heart,
Welcoming,
Allowing whatever arises to arise.
For our final couple of minutes,
Visualizing a heart on fire in the middle of your chest.
We've set the heart on fire.
Rumi says,
It is the burning of the heart I want,
This burning which is everything,
More precious than a worldly empire because it calls love secretly in the night.
Resting in the echoes of the practice and coming out gently when you're ready.
